Tempted by a Cowboy. Sarah M. Anderson

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       Three

      “You’re the new trainer?”

      Jo fought hard to keep the grin off her face. She wasn’t entirely sure she succeeded. Even yesterday, when he’d been toasted, she hadn’t been able to surprise Phillip Beaumont. But she’d caught him off guard this morning.

      How bad was his hangover? It had to be killer. She could smell whiskey from where she stood. But she would have never guessed it just by looking at him. Hell, his eyes weren’t even bloodshot. He had a three-day-old scruff on his cheeks that should have looked messy but, on him, made him look better—like a man who worked with his hands.

      Other than that...she let her eyes drift over his body. The jeans weren’t the fancy kind that he’d spent hundreds of dollars to make look old and broken in—they looked like the kind he’d broken in himself. The denim work shirt was much the same. Yes, his brown boots had probably cost a pretty penny once—but they were scuffed and scratched, not polished to a high shine. These were his work clothes and he was clearly comfortable in them.

      The suit he’d had on yesterday had been the outfit of the Phillip Beaumont who went to parties and did commercials. But the Phillip Beaumont who was petting Betty’s ears today?

      This was a cowboy. A real one.

      Heat flooded her body. She forced herself to ignore it. She would not develop a crush or an infatuation or even an admiration for Phillip Beaumont just because he looked good in jeans.

      She’d been right about him. He had no memory of yesterday and he’d spiked his coffee this morning. He was everything she couldn’t allow herself, all wrapped up in one attractive package. She had a job to do. And if she did it well, a reference from Phillip Beaumont would be worth its weight in gold. It’d be worth that smile of his.

      “I believe,” she said with a pointed tone that let him know he wasn’t fooling anyone, “that we established our identities yesterday afternoon.”

      The change was impressive. It only took a matter of seconds for his confusion to be buried beneath a warm smile. “Forgive me.” He managed to look appropriately contrite while also adding a bit of smolder to his eyes. The effect was almost heady. She was not falling for this. Not at all. “I’m just a little surprised. The other trainers have been...”

      “Older? Male? Richard told me about his previous attempts.” She turned her attention back to the horse to hide her confusion. She could not flutter. Too much was at risk here.

      Sun did seem to be calming down. Which meant he hadn’t made that screaming noise in a couple of minutes. He was still racing as if his life depended on it, though. “I think it’s clear that Sun needs something else.”

      “And that’s you?” He kept his tone light and conversational, but she could hear the doubt lurking below the surface.

      The other three men had all been crusty old farts, men who’d been around horses their whole lives. Not like her. “Yup. That’s me.”

      Phillip leaned against the paddock fence. Jo did not like how aware of his body she was. He kicked a foot up on the lowest railing and draped his arms over the top of the fence. It was all very casual—and close enough to touch.

      “So what’s your plan to fix him?”

      She sighed. “As I told you yesterday, I don’t fix horses. No one can fix him.”

      She managed to keep the crack about whether or not he’d remember this conversation tomorrow to herself. She was already pushing her luck with him and she knew it. He was still paying her and, given how big a mess Sun was, she might have enough to put a down payment on her own ranch after this.

      Wouldn’t that be the ultimate dream? A piece of land to call her own, where the Phillip Beaumonts of the world would bring her their messed-up horses. She wouldn’t have to spend days driving across country and showering in a trailer. Betty could run wild and free on her own grass. Her own ranch would be safety and security and she wouldn’t have to deal with people at all. Just horses. That’s what this job could give to her.

      That’s why she needed to work extra hard on keeping her distance from the man who was still close enough to touch.

      He ignored the first part of the statement. “Then what do you do?”

      There was no way to sum up what she did. So she didn’t. “Save him.”

      Because she was so aware of Phillip’s body, she felt the tension take hold of him. She turned her head just enough to look at him out of the corner of her eye. Phillip’s gaze was trained on the half-crazed horse in the paddock. He looked stricken, as if her words had sliced right through all his charm and left nothing but a raw, broken man who owned a raw, broken horse.

      Then he looked at her. His eyes—God, there was so much going on under the surface. She felt herself start to get lost in them, but Sun whinnied, pulling her back to herself.

      She could not get lost in Phillip Beaumont. To do so would be to take that first slippery step back down the slope to lost nights and mornings in strangers’ beds. And there would be no coming back from that this time.

      So she said, in a low voice, “I only save horses.”

      “I don’t need to be saved, thank you very much.”

      Again, the change was impressive. The warm smile that bordered on teasing snapped back onto his face and the honest pain she’d seen in his eyes was gone beneath a wink and twinkle.

      She couldn’t help it. She looked at his coffee mug. “If you say so.”

      His grip tightened on the handle, but that was the only sign he’d gotten her meaning. He probably thought the smell of the coffee masked the whiskey. Maybe it did for regular folks, but not for her.

      “How are you going to save my horse then?” It came out in the same voice he might use to ask a woman on a date.

      It was time to end this conversation before things went completely off the rails. “One day at a time.”

      Let’s see if he catches that, she thought as she opened the gate and slowly walked back into the paddock, Betty trailing at her heels.

      As she closed the gate behind her, she heard Richard come out of the barn. “Mr. Beaumont—you’re up!”

      Good. СКАЧАТЬ